As was his duty, Mr. Zelley came often to see them. The snows were so deep he could not travel by horse, so he came on snowshoes with his Bible under his arm. Each woman he saw separately, praying with her and trying to comfort her. What he said to Mrs. Hannah all heard as soon as the roads were broken out and she was out among her gossips, but what he said to Doll no one knew, although in after years much that she said to him was known. Mrs. Bilby said that once he came out of Doll’s chamber like a soul spewed out of Hell. He looked roundabout him wildly as if he had seen a most frightful sight or heard most frightful things. Without as much as a word for the woman (who hoped he would pause and elucidate for her certain problems she had found in Leviticus), he seized upon a bottle of rumbullion, swallowed half of that, and made out of the house as though the devils were after him. The truth is on that day Doll had confessed to him that she was a witch. Up to this time he had always praised the Christian fortitude, the piety, the humbleness, and sobriety of Bilby’s Doll. But after that he came to be much agitated at the mere mention of her name, shaking his head, exclaiming, ‘Dear me,’ or mentioning the fact that we are all miserable sinners. He was about the Bilby house more than ever, seeing Doll always alone and in her own chamber. When it was said that Doll was a witch, he would reprove the speaker, sadly bidding him keep such light thoughts on serious matters to himself. Of course the Bible proves to us that there were witches in the days of Leviticus and Kings—but to-day ... now, he was not sure such things exist. ‘Then you do not believe that Jonet Greene...?’ ‘There does not live a more excellent Christian. Fools call her a witch because she begins to lean upon her staff and she has a wandering eye. Many do so and have such.’ ‘Nor yet in the justice done upon the bodies of certain witches in Boston?’ ‘I will not judge of Boston. I speak only of Cowan Corners.’ By these beliefs he gained some friends and lost others. If one does not believe in witches, how can one believe in devils, and if not in devils, how then in Hell?—and Hell is, as all know, the fundamental principle on which good conduct and Christian faith are built. The women in the Bilby house rarely spoke. Each knew her own duty and did it. The indentured servants kept to the barn, so there was no noise but the swish of the women’s skirts or brooms, the rattle of cooking ware, the slam of a door. Even the house dog, grown old and deaf, never barked. The cats, five in all, partook of the silence. They slipped from room to room, eyeing the women suspiciously, but without half the suspicion with which Hannah eyed them. On a cold night, Gideon, a big malty tom, being chill, sought animal warmth. He jumped upon Widow Bilby’s bed. She woke gagged with fear. She seized Gideon and, in spite of the clawing that shredded her arms, strangled him.